Hidden Scars
by RedRobyn2
Summary: At the second Argo 2 reunion party the gang sees some suspicious scars on Percy that couldn't have come from monster fighting. When they confront him he panics and runs. Was Percy's childhood as great as be always made it out to be? Mentions of abuse.


**Hi, so this is my first PJO fanfiction but I absolutely love the books.**

 **Sorry if anything is OOC**

 **I own nothing. (WHY?!)**

 **Happy Birthday Percy Jackson!**

 **Warning: Mentions of abuse.**

 **The monthly Argo reunion parties are real, Percy mentions it in Percy Jackson and the Greek Heroes. He also mentions that he and Jason are really close, so yeah.**

 **Summary: At the monthly Argo reunion party, which includes the Seven, Coach Hedge, Nico, Reyna, Calypso and Thalia, they decide to go swimming, but everyone sees a lot of scars on Percy that are obviously not from monster fighting. So how did he really get them and was his childhood as good as they assumed it was?**

 **This takes place in about September, so about two months after the second Giant War.**

 **Hope you enjoy.**

 **Robyn out.**

 **Hidden Scars**

Percy's day really hadn't been going well so far, but this, this took the icing of the cake. And the cherry of the cake. You know what? Maybe it just took the whole cake.

It was the second monthly Argo reunion party and everyone, meaning the Seven (including Leo, who had shown up with Calypso just over a month ago. Thankfully there were no hard feelings between Calypso and himself.) Nico, Reyna, Calypso, Coach Hedge (who was now a very proud father) and Thalia. The whole gang was excited for the last chance to meet up before they all split ways, either to go to school, college, back to the Hunters or running a camp.

Why had his day been going so badly? I hear you ask.

Well, you try dealing with a peace treaty between the two camps, helping some of the newer kids, teaching three classes, working on yet another book, dealing with Drew and surviving through an hour long lecture by the slimey weasel Octavian, then see what your day is like.

Anyway, back to the reunion party.

It was pretty much a get together where they played some games, talked, told stories and eat sweets. Though they all had an agreement to never again give Leo and Nico skittles *Shudder*. It was bad enough last time.

Thankfully everyone got along...well mostly. If you don't count all the arguments between Nico and Thalia that is.

Last month they had simply celebrated on the Argo 2, which now stood proudly in Camp Half Blood, but this time someone *cough Leo cough* had suggested they go swimming in the sea.

Unfortunate for Percy everyone had agreed, some more reluctantly than others, and they had all automatically assumed that he would love to go swimming.

Usually Percy would be up for it, but since the war and almost being drowned multiple times and his claustrophobia getting worse, he had taken to trying to avoid the water.

But it seemed like this time, his very limited luck had run out. Nico, Thalia, Jason and Hazel had all been assured that his dad wouldn't try to kill them and everyone else was changed, ready to go have fun in the water.

He had gotten changed like everyone else, blue swimming trunks, a plain grey t-shirt hung loosely over his thin, malnourished (Both he and Annabeth were still trying to put more weight on after falling into...there.) swimmers body. His messy black hair hung in front of his sea green eyes that gleamed with a bright light, mimicking the joy on the large smile on his face.

If anyone had looked closer, they would have realized both the smile and light in his eyes were fake.

Percy had planned to stay on the actual beach to stop his fear of drowning. But that wasn't the complete reason he had been worried about swimming, no, he was worried about what his friends would say about all his scars, especially the scars that did not look like they were from monster fighting. And they would be right with those thoughts. A lot of his scars were not from monster fighting, but rather from years of abuse from Gabe.

Gabe. He despised the name and yet he was still scared of the man, his voice and smell plagued his dreams. Yes, the fearless, two time hero of Olympus, son of Poseidon and a bunch of other stupid titles was terrified of a mortal. A smelly, dirty, walrus of a man.

You couldn't really blame him fully though for being terrified, the man, though he can be barely called that, had abused him since he was four right up until he was turned to stone. Eight years of pain, eight years of keeping quite, eight years of abuse.

That was one of his deepest, darkest secrets. One he wanted no one to know. He had promised himself years ago that he would never tell anyone, too scared that Gabe would hurt his mother. When he arrived in Camp, he didn't want to appear weak and he had just never been able to admit that he had been hurt as well, scared of what they would have thought of him.

His plan hadn't worked, not at all. Honestly he should think about adding it to his list of Seaweed Brain's Worst Plans EVER, In The History Of Plans. Or SBWPE,ITHOP. Huh, maybe he should think about shortening that name.

As soon as they had gotten down to the beach, everyone had run into the cool water, well he guess it was a hot day. And when he said hot day he meant scorching, fry your eyebrows off hot. When he had hovered on the beach everyone had given him weird looks, but seeing as all four other Big Three kids were in the water and yet the son of Poseidon wasn't, that was to be expected.

He had quickly put on a huge smile, given a truly horrible joke and ran into the water to the waist. He had to be more careful if he didn't want to be called out on his behaviour. Act natural, he reprimanded himself (see, having Annabeth as a girlfriend did mean he had learnt some stuff). Wait...what the Tarturaus was natural?

Percy joined the others in splashing around, making himself create shapes in the water to entertain the others. Eventually he was dragged into a splash fight. It was Nico, Jason, Leo and Percy against Thalia, Piper, Frank and Annabeth. The fight ended with neither team really winning, but both teams being soaked.

Percy gave a real smile, maybe things weren't too bad after all.

"Hey Percy! Why don't you take your t-shirt off?" Jason shouted drawing looks from the others.

He just had to jinx himself, didn't he?

Percy looked nervously at his friends then started to take his top off, there was no way to avoid it.

He quickly pulled it off and ducked under the water.

It was a battle of fear. Drowning vs his friend's disappointment. Friends won.

He hoped the water would cover his scars, but as he should of guessed Lady Luck was really not in his favour. The water was bright, clean and completely see through. Meaning all his friends could now see his patch work of scars that criss-crossed his body.

"Man, Percy. What the hell happened to you. Some of those scars definitely aren't from monster fighting." Jason's expression turned to a mix of shock and concern at seeing his friend's scars.

Everyone else had similar looks on their faces, worried and yet curious about what had happened to their friend.

"What are you talking about Jason? Of course they are from monster fighting." Percy put on a fake grin and tried to play it off. Unfortunately, thus time everyone could see through his fake smile.

"Percy. Are you okay? I was with you when you went on most of your quests, I don't recognize half of those scars." Annabeth said, wading through the water heading towards her boyfriend.

His eyes darted around at his friends expressions and stances, he was cornered.

He did the only thing he could think of.

He ran.

Percy sprinted across camp and back to his cabin, quickly locking the door, ignoring the shouts of his friends and questioning glances be received as be ran.

He slipped down the door until he was resting his back against it. How could be have run? They would be even more suspicious now!

"Percy. Are you alright? Can you open the door please?" Annabeth's voiced drifted through the door, signalling the arrival of all his friends. Well possibly ex-friends after all, why would they want to be friends with him after this?

He stayed silent and after a couple of minutes he heard Annabeth sigh and turn to talk to someone else.

"Percy, open the door. We just want to talk." Paper's voice, laced with charm speak danced into the cabin.

Percy unwillingly stood up and opened the door before going and sitting on his bed, knowing he wouldn't be able to escape their questions.

The seven, Nico, Reyna, Calypso, Coach Hedge and Thalia crowded into the cabin followed swiftly by Katie, The Stolls, Clarrise, Chris, Will, Rachel and Grover who had obviously been drawn over by all the shouting.

They all looked awkwardly at him sitting on the bed with his head down, looking at the floor. His scars were still un covered and very noticeable.

Everyone sat down on the floor or anything around, Annabeth chose to sit down right next to him on the bed. She put an arm around him, hoping to comfort him.

"Percy, what's wrong? Why did you run?" She asked gently. He didn't answer.

"It's to do with your scars, isn't it? Percy's know you and I know you didn't get them from monster fighting, so how did you get them?" She prodded again.

"I'm just clumsy, it's nothing to worry about." Percy desperately tried to joke it off, laughing a clearly fake laugh.

"No one's that clumsy, not even you Kelp Head." Thalia said, unusually kind.

"Who hurt you? I know the signs of abuse when I see it. Who was it?" Clarrise grunted, causing everyone to look at her shocked.

Percy looked at her, how did she know?

"My mother got drunk a lot after my dad left, she started to take it out on me, until i ran away and found camp." Clarrise answers the silent question. "It wasn't that bad, just a bit or punch or kick here but still..." She trailed off. The others looked at her with a bit more respect and Chris put an arm around her shoulders for support.

Silence rang in the cabin for a few minutes.

"My stepfather." Percy whispered. "My stepfather would him me if I did anything wrong. He would do it for fun sometimes, he would hit me, punch me, kick me, burn me, use a knife, hit me with a belt. Whatever he wanted to do." His voice turned near hysterical near the end. He nodded his tha 's and understanding to Clarrise.

Everyone in the room looked at him in shock. He had been abused. Percy, the person who was always there for you, the person who could get you to smile through the worst times, was abused by his stepfather.

"Percy, why didn't you tell me or anyone?" Annabeth asked trying to get over her shock and horror.

"He threatened to hurt my mom if I told anyone and even when he was gone, I was scared and I thought you would be disappointed or hate me." His voice was quiet but it echoed around the room.

"We could never hurt or be disappointed in you, Perce." Grover said, ashamed that he hadn't even known his best friend had been abused.

"Yeah, Kelpie if anything it makes you stronger in my mind." Jason smiled up at his cousin.

"How long." Nico asked suddenly. "How long did he abuse you?" Percy gave a small smile to himself, after Nico had told him about his old crush on him they got along a lot better and all five cousins were like siblings. Percy and Thalia had both helped Nico and Will finally start dating.

"Since I was four, he started about a month after he married my mom."

"I'm going to kill that monster, than make sure he suffers for eternity!" Will squeezed his boyfriend's hand to help calm him down.

"Yeah, Kelp-for-brains were is he, I'm going to kill him for hurting my cousin!" Thalia declared, gaining quite a few cheers in response.

"He's already dead, he met Medusa's head." Percy gave a genuine smile. "I think he's in some museum in New York."

"Look, it isn't a big deal, lots of people have bad stories before camp. I'm sorry for ruining the party, but I've got to go." Percy sighed picking up his already packed bag and walking to the big house than across the border to meet his mom.

"Hey, I've got a plan!" Annabeth declared, once he was out of sight.

~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~oOo~

The next weekend, when Percy returned in the afternoon, he couldn't find any of his friends.

He dumped his bag of supplies for the weekend then walked around camp, looking for them. He asked people if they had seen them and stopped to help out some of the younger or newer campers.

Eventually, just as it was starting to get dark, he asked Nyssa who told him they were in the forest, in a clearing near Juniper's tree.

He thanked her than jogged to wards the forest, his hand in his pocket, ready to retrieve Riptide and fight any monsters he came across.

As he walked through the forest be couldn't help but wonder why they were In the forest. We're they hiding from him? Or were they doing something else? Or were they all werewolves and they met up in the forest at night to change then howl at the- oops getting of track, stupid ADHD.

He stopped in the tree surrounding the clearing in shock.

As Nyssa had said they were all out here. The group of 14 demigods, 2 satyr, 1 Hunter, a remittance and the Oracle sat around a small camp fire roasting marshmallows, making smores, talking and laughing.

Will and Nico were eating marshmallows snuggled up by the fire, Thalia, Annabeth, Jason and Piper were talking and laughing on the other side of the fire. The Stolls and Leo were whispering to each other, no doubt planning pranks, Katie and Rachel making smores and glancing wearily at the mischievous boys, Frank was showing Hazel how to make smores, Clarrise and Chris were cuddling near the fire, Reyna and Calypso sat chatting quietly and Grover and Coach Hedge were discussing something.

Percy smiled at his friends then turned around to leave, not wanting to disturb his friends. He took one step back to camp and then suddenly a silver arrow whistled past his ear finally hitting a tree.

"Don't even think about it Kelp Head, you are part of our family too." Thalia's voice caused him to stop, or maybe it was the arrow.

He turned around to see everyone looking at him, smiling openly, telling him he was welcome to their little get together.

He smiled a genuine smile and walked over to sit next to Annabeth and Thalia, aross from Nico and Will.

He was quickly dragged into a conversation and discovered for the rest of the night all his smiles and laughs were genuine.

These people didn't care about his past, they didn't think it made him weak, they thought it made him strong.

These people weren't his friends, they were his family.

 **And finished.**

 **So how was it good or bad.**

 **I would love any comments you have.**

 **Thanks for reading.**

 **Robyn out.**


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